My S3 Thread

Well - I figure I'm probably looking at the best part of $250/300 for the bushes and ball joints to be replaced and I need the car daily so can't really take the arms off, take them somewhere for the bushes to be done and wait. They bushes are knackered and need it done soon else I'd get Seb on it. His hoist never seems to be free.

I used Redline MT90 (which is GL4) 75w90 for the gearbox and transfer box. Easy enough job to do, just access to the filler cap is a bit limited. Some may need this:
Volkswagen R32 MKIV 3.2 > Maintenance > Transmission > ES#8234 M16 Drain Plug Socket, 1/2" Drive - SCW3357
(which I bought and didn't need!)
This was really handy as space is tight on the filler:
Volkswagen R32 MKIV 3.2 > Tools > Maintenance Tools > ES#2221248 8-In-1 Oil Drain Plug Hex Wrench - W-136PNM
 
Sam_ said:
Well - I figure I'm probably looking at the best part of $250/300 for the bushes and ball joints to be replaced and I need the car daily so can't really take the arms off, take them somewhere for the bushes to be done and wait. They bushes are knackered and need it done soon else I'd get Seb on it. His hoist never seems to be free.

I used Redline MT90 (which is GL4) 75w90 for the gearbox and transfer box. Easy enough job to do, just access to the filler cap is a bit limited. Some may need this:
Volkswagen R32 MKIV 3.2 > Maintenance > Transmission > ES#8234 M16 Drain Plug Socket, 1/2" Drive - SCW3357
(which I bought and didn't need!)
This was really handy as space is tight on the filler:
Volkswagen R32 MKIV 3.2 > Tools > Maintenance Tools > ES#2221248 8-In-1 Oil Drain Plug Hex Wrench - W-136PNM
Click to expand...

its abit of a drive for you sam but not as far as me.. try East Cost Suspensions Seb recommended them for me.. they do a quick job just tell them that you need the car ASAP i think it would take em 1 day or less to fit them for you and they do work on race porsche so not bad.. they did my corner balancing and wheel alignment.. im going there again after fitting the rear tie arms
 
btw how many liters you reckon the box around 4 liters ? but no idea bout the rear diff
 
Oh cool. Yeah I'll do there for the alignment then.

I'd get 4 to be safe. I used a little over 3 (about 3.25) in the end but spilt quite a bit down my arm etc (****** suction pump leaked). Talking of suction pumps, worth buying one of those too. Unless you're Austin Powers and you can use the one from your Swedish penis enlarger.
 
Sam_ said:
How much do you need? I'm going to grab a quart from a guy in Eastwood if you want me to grab a couple. The only downer is he's about twice the price of ECS. $26/quart for MT90
Click to expand...

Need enough to do the box, transfer case and rear diff. The eBay guy in Eastwood is my best bet too as shipping from ECS is around $75
 
Haha.. nice one lol yes i try but ill be putting it in the new box.. btwbthe rear diff uses the fuild aye?
 
audi upgrades
If you spill about the same amount as me, you'll need about 4.5 quarts.

I was under the impression the rear fluid was the same as the front. ECS lists it that way. Some people seem to say it's different though?
 
Yeah thats wat i read too.. hence getting 6quarts ill shoot them an email to confirm
 
audi upgrades
Sam_ said:
MT90 or GL4 front only - 3-4qts
GL5 rear only - 1-2 qts
Click to expand...

so the eBay guy in Eastwood has both the MT90 75W90 GL-4 Gear Oil and the 75W90NS GL-5 Gear Oil

Just under $150 for the 4 + 2 quarts without delivery.
 
Lucky Eastwood's not too far out though if you wanted to pick up. Or like I say, I have to go grab some GL5 for the rear myself so I could get the lot and you could grab it from me. Up to you...

Quite looking forward to getting these arms after this review:
VWVortex.com - New Tubular Control Arms on My .:R32T

controlarm_tubular_mk4_blk2.jpg


I ordered them with boots to cover the rose joints...
 
Yeah, bit dubious but has to be better than shagged, old bushes. Everyone that doesn't have a rose jointed setup is like "it'll be terrible, joints will wear out, noisy, etc" and those that do say it's awesome and have no issues. I guess they might not want to admit they'd wasted a stack of cash but usually people are quick to be negative about a product. One guy on there has been running a fully rose jointed car for 100k and had no issues driving it daily. Says it's awesome and actually is better on tyre wear, amongst other things. Getting a bit more feeling into the car will be nice. I'll be running solid top mounts too. Plus the finish matches the rear arms :)
 
Have been eyeing these up for ages to help sort my geo out, as somethings not right up front which is why I originally got the top mounts but could definately do with the other adjustment, suspect my subframe is not quite true?

You'll have to let me know what theyre like ;)
 
Will do, you'd be running a similar setup up front if you got them. You got solid subframe bushes? Going to get a set from 034 rather than the other **** takers :)
 
Pretty simular, im fully polybushed but havent got any subframe bushes as am running my subframe off centre to try and correct my geo problems :(

When I get the time and priorities have moved from the engine I will be sorting it and probably will replace the subframe ;)
 
Oh, you reckon it's had a knock then? Shouldn't be too hard to find one there? It'd be mental here I bet...
 
Sam_ said:
Lucky Eastwood's not too far out though if you wanted to pick up. Or like I say, I have to go grab some GL5 for the rear myself so I could get the lot and you could grab it from me. Up to you...

Quite looking forward to getting these arms after this review:
VWVortex.com - New Tubular Control Arms on My .:R32T

controlarm_tubular_mk4_blk2.jpg


I ordered them with boots to cover the rose joints...
Click to expand...


my old car had rose jointed lower are and they crash, banged and rattled my teeth out.

looks like your building a full track car
 
audi upgrades
Andrew@A.L.D said:
my old car had rose jointed lower are and they crash, banged and rattled my teeth out.

looks like your building a full track car
Click to expand...

Depends pretty heavily on the joints from what I've read. Some people have the same experience as yourself. Others (like some in that thread) seem to have good experiences.

I'll get those solid bushes direct. Don't have duty here unless it's over $1k. It's hit and miss there isn't it? Can't say I ever got stung when I was back there? Maybe I was lucky...
 
Got a few bits done today

Haldex service
Pretty easy, only issue I found was filling it back up, getting the tube out and the drain plug back in without spilling too much. Some fill through the level hole but apparently that's risky as there's a nut in there that can be dislogged and fall inside the Haldex. Not ideal.

Rear diff oil change
Grabbed some Redline GL5 this morning. Literally a ten minute job to change it with the right tools (that schwaben 8 in 1 tool is awesome). Oil stank and looked brown so feel a bit glad it's changed. I guess as it's apparently a "lifetime fluid" according to Audi, it's probably never been done. I also added some moly additive that I had left over from the front. I managed to get 1 litre (some said 1.2L, not sure how as I waited for ages for it to fully drain) in there. I now have a spare litre of GL5 if anyone local is going to do their rear diff. I'll flog it for $20, save $6 !

20mm Whiteline ARB (rear) + Rose jointed drop links
Seemed silly not to do this while it was in the air. Bit of a fiddly job but nothing too hard. Annoying the little stopper blocks (to stop the bar sliding sideways) were a little bit out, so I had to adjust them slightly but again a 2 second job, just annoying.

Car feels a bit tighter and the scrubbing I used to get on tight turns seems to have gone completely so that's awesome. Didn't fit the rear arms but I need to do it ASAP, the rear tyres are almost shot on the inside after less than year. Can probably get a few more months out of them if I get the camber sorted. Think I'm going to take the front TCAs, rear TCAs and Ground Control top mounts to a suspension place to fit and setup with 4 wheel alignment. Seems logical to do it at once. Only downer is, I got an email from USRT saying the tubular front arms will be 6 weeks, so basically around Christmas by which the tyres might be shot. ******.

While I was doing the work today, I noticed my exhaust hangs real low and doesn't have a middle hanger. Might chuck a thread up about that as some seem to have it and others not. Wonder if there's a part I can retro fit. The exhaust hangs low and there's one speed bump on the trip to drop my mrs off that it rubs on :(
 
Got a couple of pics while out grabbing coffee

car1_sml.jpg


car2_sml.jpg


You see how close the front and rear wheels are to the arches now.

No groaning from the rear on tight parking manoeuvres now after doing the rear diff and haldex service which is good. Was worried it was something costly...
 
Sam_ said:
Got a couple of pics while out grabbing coffee

car1_sml.jpg


car2_sml.jpg


You see how close the front and rear wheels are to the arches now.

No groaning from the rear on tight parking manoeuvres now after doing the rear diff and haldex service which is good. Was worried it was something costly...
Click to expand...


i think mine is just as low sam can barely fit 2 fingers between the arch and wheels im running 17's though i have a feeling u have 18's no ? but neway i never get any rubbing and i tend to push it to the tires limit on the corners :p
 
Yeah they're 18s. Oh it's not how low it is, pictures don't capture it but it's the offset. The rear is ET5, front is ET10 on 8.5s so it's tight as.
 
ah i see mine Re just 8" all round.. yeah that would be tight but still ur car look beautifull mate..

btw wats next on ur on ur cars bucket list?
 
What offset with that 8s? That's what matters. I'd run less offset but to clear the brakes I need to run that. It's the wheels that are the issue though, being 5x120 rather than 5x100, the centres are larger.

Next is fitting:
- Gruvenparts rear arms
- USRT front tubular arms
- 034 Solid subframe bushes (need to buy)
- Powerflex rack bush
- Front arb bushes + droplinks (need to buy)
- Ground control top mounts

... and then get a 4 wheel alignment done. Probably at that place you suggested? Maybe get them to fit that lot too to be honest.
 
yeah talk to them.. seb suggested them it went well... sadly im going again the alignment is cheap though i think its 160 or so just to give u a heads up..

concerning the wheels all i know is that they are 17*8's Oz ultralegerra
 
Fitted the Gruvenparts rear arms yesterday. Relatively easy to do. I noticed my rose joints in the hub weren't seized (but quite stiff still) which was good to know. The only hard part is getting the camber all sorted. I tried to match the length of each arm to the stock arms, only to realise the top and bottom arms were very slightly different lengths (bottom longer). I "guessed" at what it should have been and ended up with a bit of positive camber! In the end I just ended up setting them to the same as stock as I ran out of time and had to pick the mrs up from work. Didn't take any pictures as wasn't sure it was worth it. The car does feel tighter cornering now, hard to explain the sensation but I think it'll get better once it's all properly setup.

Next, wait for the front tubular arms to arrive, fit them along with the GC top mounts, poly rack bush, poly arb bushes, get it all setup and hopefully have an awesome handling car!
 
I'm considering flogging the CHs to get a set of these:

DSC04376.jpg


DSC04396.jpg


18x9 Pro Race 1.2s in Anthracite

They'll clear the brakes better, probably lighter and look tougher? Any thoughts?
 
So it, i love pro race 1.2's, only thing is 9" may be abit too wide and cause issues in the front with the strut but i believe the backs should just fit.
 
They are nice but think the BBS suit it better maybe get them sprayed if your looking for a different colour
 
A few people are running 9.5s so I "should" be ok. Worst case, I'll get the fronts wings rolled. I currently run ET10 8.5s (which very occasionally hit) so if I run ET20 I'll have more outer clearance which should be good. I have plenty of strut clearance and ran ET20 before. I'm going to run a bit more front camber soon so that might help too.
 
audi upgrades
Some goodies on their way:

- Tial QR Recirc Valve
QRlg.jpg


- SPA Fuel + Boost Pressure Dual Gauge
spa_boost-fuel-p-blk-g.jpg


- IE Surge Tank (will need to work out where to fit this, and plumb it in)
integrated_engineering_044_surge_tank_with_pump.jpg


- IE Inlet Manifold (will be running the 60mm throttle initially, see how I go)
Integrated Engineering 1.8T Transverse Intake Manifold

- IE Coilpack adapters
- Legit Bosch 044 pump (in prep for the GT2871)

The AGU lump I have is also being prepped. I think the block was off the machinist today. Still deciding whether to get normal IE rods (rifle drilled) or just get Tuscans and future proof myself. I've always gone for "buy good, buy once" kinda thing.
 
Yeah, that's the plan. Get it to the level where it's a decent fast road + odd trackday spec.

I have a tendency to sniff out bargains and hunt VWVortex daily. TT, R32 + FI sections. There's usually some good deals. I guess the downer being in the UK is the possible duty, although being used, might be less of an issue? Australia has no duty on items under $1,000 which is good.

Went to my accountant today to sort my tax and my bill is way less than I was expecting so had a good solid amount left over. I was thinking I could spend it on the car but the mrs had other plans...
 
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